repeated in private, is introduced; and being led to the bridegroom and her right hand placed in his, they are bound together with some blades of the sacred cúsa grass, amid the sound of cheerful music. They then walk forth thus united, evidently for the purpose of publicly declaring their union, and then retire into an inner room of the house. Here an altar is prepared with the usual solemnities; various oblations are offered, and various ceremonies are performed, indicative either of the duties of the married state, or figuratively expressive of good wishes for the happiness and prosperity of the married couple. Among other customs, the bride is clad in a new garment, belonging to the bridegroom, and the skirts of their mantles are tied together in a knot; and this, with the ligature of cúsa grass above mentioned, are actual representations of the bands of wedlock, and the marriage knot, which among ourselves are known only as figurative expressions. These expressions may, however, very reasonably be considered as the remains of ancient usages (similar to those described by the Hindu Sastras), practised and observed by our ancestors. After this, the bride steps seven steps into seven concentric circles, a holy text being recited at every step, and the marriage is then com pleted and irrevocable. When these rites are finished,

the company depart, and the new-married pair are left in the company of their nearer relations, who continue the performance of ceremonies similar in form and import to those performed amid the more public assembly of neighbours and friends. These continue for three days, during which time, the married pair continue in the house of the bride's father, and live abstemiously and chastely; at the conclusion of the fourth day, the bride is conveyed to the house of the bridegroom, usually attended by a long train of friends, and with as much splendour and show, as the circumstances of the parties will allow. On arriving at his house, some of the former ceremonies are repeated, with others significative of attachment and fidelity. An infant is placed in the arms of the wife, to remind her of the duties of a mother. With this, the whole of the ceremony terminates, which, it may be said, consists of rites significant of the general purposes of wedlock, and conducted throughout, as far, at least, as the rules of the Sastras are observed, with the greatest decency and de

corum.

Ó M. Menú writes (chap. 2. 76.), “ Brahmá milked out, as it were, from the three Védas, the letter A, the letter U, and the letter M; which form by coalition the tri-literal

monosyllable" Aum, pronounced as though it were spelled OM. This monosyllable, Menú declares, in a subsequent verse, (v. 84.) to be " the symbol of God, the Lord of created beings." Each of the three compound letters has its mysterious signification. The first denotes Brahmá, the second Vishnú, and the third Síva. This syllable is never pronounced by the Hindús, except inaudibly, or as it were inwardly, and never without much solemn preparation. "If," says Menú (ch. 2. v. 75.) “he have sitten on culms of cúsa, with their points towards the east, and be purified by rubbing that holy grass in both his hands, and be further prepared by three suppressions of breath, he may then fitly pronounce Ó M." Whether this Indian monosyllable be the same as the Egyptian ON, will be inquired perhaps, rather from the near resemblance, than from any positive authority. It is, however, rendered in some degree probable, by the circumstance that O N was significative of the sun, and the sun originally signified the author of heat and light and life.

Para Brahma. Vide Brahma.

Patna, is a city of the province of Allahabad, situate on the Ganges. Anciently the Sône joined the river Ganges at this place, but now at Moneah, a town eighteen miles

higher up that river. This change is owing to the action of the waters on the very light soil, of which the greater part of the tracts of country contiguous to the Ganges consist for these countries, and especially Behár and Bengála, being extremely flat, and the stream at all times, particularly during the inundation, very rapid, changes in the channel are continually taking place; and these continued changes are so great, that the geographer Rennel, in his Memoir on the Ganges, conjectures, with every appearance of probability and truth, that the whole of the soil of Bengála has been, at different times, removed by the action of the waters.

Pavána is one of the eight guardian deities: he presides over

the winds, and as such, is deemed the chief minister of Indra, the god of the air. He is feigned, in an ingenious allegory, to ride furiously along the heavens on the back of an antelope, brandishing a scymeter gleaming like lightning. His inferior genii, or ministers, are called Mérúts.

Peons. These are a sort of footmen attending persons of rank in India. The word means a messenger.

Pindara and Sohágepúr, are mountainous districts in the province of Allahabad.

Pippal. The ficus religiosa. Vide Váta. The rules of the

sástra are very particular respecting the staff, from a persuasion, that a proper staff has great efficacy in controlling and driving away evil spirits. (Vide Menú, ch. 2. v. 45, &c.) To the vast power the staff is supposed to have in driving away evil spirits, according to the old European system of Demonology, each conjuror or magician holds a thin staff or wand when he exercises his art; evidently for the

same reason.

Pyre. The Hindú funerals are attended and followed by solemnities, esteemed the most important of any in their ritual; and so essential to the happiness of the departed person, that it is considered the greatest misfortune to be destitute of a son or adopted heir, who may duly perform these important rites. When the sick person is about to die, he is carried from his house to the side of some tank, or river, if possible the Ganges; he is sprinkled with water, and receives a kind of extreme unction with the mud. When dead, the corpse is washed, anointed with oils and perfumes, and after some pieces of gold have been put in his eyes, nostrils, and ears, and some other articles of value in his mouth, probably for the same purposes as the Romans used to put a piece of money in the mouth of the dead person to pay the ferrying Charon, it is covered with a cloth, and is carried directly by the nearest relations to